“Evening Falls” is the international debut recording of a gifted musician from the seemingly inexhaustible Norwegian talent pool that ECM has returned to over the decades. It features Jacob Young, a guitarist, bandleader, improviser and jazz composer whose sensibilities have been shaped both by the history of the music as it has unfolded in the North and by his knowledge of the American jazz tradition, studied also at first hand.

Young’s principal teacher was the great guitarist Jim Hall (Jacob’s warm, glowing, rounded tone acknowledges the influence) with whom he studied in New York.

The band playing on “Evening Falls” has been a working group for two years now and is uniquely set up by Young to reflect the styles and ideas of three generations of Norwegian improvisers – the age range of the band stretches from 24 (extraordinary young trumpeter Matthias Eick, also making waves with the band Jaga Jazzist) to 60 (veteran drumming genius Jon Christensen). The band’s full line up is Jacob Young (guitars), Mathias Eick (trumpet), Vidar Johansen (bass clarinet and tenor saxophone), Mats Eilertsen (double-bass), and Jon Christensen (drums). All of them make effective improvisational use of the open spaces in Young’s lyrical compositions; interaction takes place at a high level…

The quintet launches the CD with a Norwegian tour beginning in Mo i Rana on March 3rd and finishing in Kristiansand on March 12th. On March 6th they play twice in Oslo, with an in-store promo concert at the Bare Jazz shop and a gig at the Herr Nilsen club. General European release of “Evening Falls” follows on March 22nd.